BY ASHLI WORKMAN '08

Influence today is not measured in billboards. It’s measured in engagement and connection.

Every year, millions of dollars are spent by major brands trying to capture your attention and persuade you to spend your discretionary dollars with them.

As a marketing professional, I’ve seen both ends of that spectrum -- from managing a luxury travel brand with a $5 million annual marketing budget to leading smaller tourism destinations working with a fraction of that amount. But no matter the size of the purse strings, one of the first lessons I learned in Marketing 101 remains just as true today: Word-of-mouth is the most powerful form of persuasion.

Budget can amplify a message. It cannot replace trust.

Think about the last time you completed a consumer survey for a brand. How often did you check the circle indicating that your decision was influenced by someone you trust -- a friend, a colleague, a recommendation? More often than not, that small circle carries enormous weight.

That is the power of credibility.

As social media has evolved from a way to pass time into a global business engine, word-of-mouth hasn’t disappeared--it has just simply changed form. Today, digital influence and word-of-mouth are nearly synonymous.

Social media has fundamentally changed how destinations are discovered. Travelers no longer rely solely on printed brochures and they have traded in their traditional travel agents for TikTok  content. 

But nonetheless, they still rely on people. Their friends, their family, their colleagues (and sometimes even their sister’s boyfriend’s mom) are the ones who convinced them just by merely posting vacation photos online. Ultimately, we all just yearn for and rely on authenticity.

For the past eight years, I’ve had the privilege of leading destination marketing and awareness for Allegany County, the Mountainside of Maryland, the official destination management organization for Allegany County, and the same mountains that Frostburg State University calls home. At its core, destination marketing is storytelling. It’s about shaping a narrative of place, of people, and of experience. And increasingly, that narrative is carried through social platforms.

Travelers trust the voice behind the screen. Whether it’s the brand itself setting the scene of a biker greeting the bright sunrise along the Great Allegheny Passage, a paid influencer/foodie sharing a coffee flight from a downtown Cumberland café, or an alum bringing their family back for Homecoming and capturing the excitement of its festivities in real time. All these moments shape our decisions, both consciously and subconsciously.

And for a place like Allegany County, that matters since our Appalachian Mountains compete with destinations that have much larger budgets and national name recognition.  While we don’t always win with volume, we often win with story. We win with authenticity.

Like most destinations, we are story-driven. Our trails, waterways, historic downtowns and small businesses and the entrepreneurs behind them come alive when someone who genuinely loves this place shares it. A single Instagram reel from an engaged alum can possibly reach more potential visitors with more credibility than any traditional print advertisement ever could.

Influence isn’t about vanity metrics. It’s about stewardship.

If you graduated from Frostburg State University and have built a platform, whether 2,000 followers or 200,000, you have the power to shape perception. When you post about hiking in Mountain Maryland, grabbing a craft brew and live show in Frostburg, or returning to campus with your family, you’re doing more than sharing a memory. You are organically participating in economic development. You are supporting small businesses. You are reinforcing community pride. You are reminding people that Western Maryland is worth the drive, worth the stay and worth the investment.

The same goes for when you post about your positive experience and education at FSU. The most powerful ambassadors aren’t paid spokespeople. They are often people who genuinely love where they came from.

And that begins long before a social media platform exists. It begins in dorm rooms, on late-night walks across campus, at football games, in classrooms and in friendships that outlast four years.

In a digital world, influence is simply modern word-of-mouth. And word-of-mouth has always been one of Allegany County’s greatest assets just as it has always been one of FSU’s greatest strengths.

Now it happens within tiny squares, on shared reels, and in every share. Now it happens at the speed and reach of every scroll.

Ashli Workman was named director of tourism for Allegany County in 2017, where she combined her love for Mountain Maryland, the outdoors, and her tourism and destination marketing expertise to lead the promotion of Allegany County, the Mountain Side of Maryland. Under her leadership, the destination reemerged into the marketplace through a rebranding initiative, has redefined the narrative around tourism and economic development as it relates to the outdoor economy, garnered national media coverage in placements such as Southern Living, USA Today, Travel Channel, and MSN Travel, and has been the recipient of multiple statewide and national awards.